The Chalk Circle Man

by Fred Vargas

  When he looked more closely, Danglard was not as carried away as all that by the charms of the two suspects sitting at his table. And if one looked more closely again, Danglard the thinker was watching, observing, listening and provoking, however drunk he might appear. Even in his cups, for Danglard’s incisive brain Mathilde and Reyer remained a couple of people rather too closely mixed up in a murder case. Adamsberg smiled and went over to the table.

  ‘I know,’ said Danglard, indicating the wine, ‘it’s against the rules. But these persons are not here to see me officially. They’re just passing through. It was you they wanted to see.’

  ‘And how!’ said Mathilde.

  From Mathilde’s face, Adamsberg could tell that she was furious with him. Better avoid a row in front of everyone. He gave up on the idea of a drink and took them into his office, making a conciliatory sign to Danglard. But Danglard couldn’t have cared less – he had already returned to his paperwork.

  ‘So. It seems that Clémence didn’t hold her tongue?’ Adamsberg inquired gently of Mathilde as he sat sideways at his desk.

  ‘Why should she?’ said Mathilde. ‘Apparently you badgered her with a whole lot of questions about her own life and then about Réal. Adamsberg, for heaven’s sake, what kind of behaviour is that?’

  ‘Police behaviour, I suppose,’ said Adamsberg. ‘But I didn’t badger her. Clémence has plenty to say for herself unaided, even if she whistles through her teeth. And I wanted to meet Réal Louvenel. I’ve just got back from seeing him.’

  ‘I know!’ said Mathilde. ‘And that really makes me see red!’

  ‘That’s perfectly normal,’ said Adamsberg.

  ‘What did you want to see him for?’

  ‘ To find out what you said at the Dodin Bouffant.’

  ‘For God’s sake, what’s so important about that?’

  ‘Sometimes, but only sometimes, I’m tempted to find out what people are concealing from me. And according to that article in the 5th arrondissement newsletter, you’ve been acting like a flytrap for anyone who wants to get close to the chalk circle man. So I have to take an interest. I think you have a pretty good idea who he is. I had hoped you would have said a bit more that evening, and that Louvenel would have told me about it.’

  ‘I never imagined you’d go in for such underhand dealings.’

  Adamsberg shrugged.

  ‘What about you, Madame Forestier? The first time you came into the police station. Was that straightforward dealing?’

  ‘I had no choice,’ said Mathilde. ‘But you’re supposed to be an honest man. And all of a sudden you’ve turned slippery.’

  ‘I’ve got no choice, either. Anyway, that’s how I am, I’m slippery. I have to change all the time.’

  Adamsberg rested his chin on his hand, still facing sideways. Mathilde was watching him.

  ‘It’s as I said,’ Mathilde continued. ‘You’re amoral – you should have been a prostitute.’

  ‘Just what I am being, in order to get information.’

  ‘About what?’

  ‘About him. The chalk circle man.’

  ‘Well, you’re going to be disappointed. I made it all up about the identity of the circle man, based on a few vague memories. I’ve got no proof of any of it. Pure invention.’

  ‘Little by little,’ murmured Adamsberg, ‘I’m managing to extract a few fragments of the truth. But it takes a long time. Would you be able to tell me who he is? Even if you’re making it up, it still interests me.’

  ‘It’s not based on anything serious. Only the circle man reminds me of someone I used to follow some years ago, over by Pigalle too, as it happens. I used to follow this particular man to a dark little restaurant where he lunched alone. He worked while he was eating, and never took his raincoat off. He covered his table with piles of books and papers. And when he dropped something, which happened all the time, he would lift up the hem of his raincoat as if it was a bridal train, whenever he bent down to pick it up. Sometimes his wife would come along, with her lover, to have coffee with him. Then he looked pathetic, desperate to accept any humiliation in order to hang on to whatever was left. But when the wife and her lover had gone, he would be seized with rage, he’d stab at the paper tablecloth with his knife and obviously he was pretty upset. In his place I would have had a drink, but he seemed not to touch alcohol. I noted in my book at the time “Little man greedy for power but doesn’t have it. How will he get out of this?” See, I tend to make snap judgements. Réal tells me that too: “Mathilde, you make too many snap judgements.” Then I stopped bothering with this man, he made me feel sad and edgy. I follow people to do myself good, not to go poking about in their misery. But when I saw the circle man, and his habit of holding the hem of his coat when he bent down, it reminded me of someone. I looked through my notebooks and remembered the little man who was greedy for power but had none at all, and I thought “Well, why not? Is this perhaps the way he’s found to exercise some kind of power?” Another snap judgement, and that’s where I left it. You see, Adamsberg, you’re disappointed, aren’t you? It wasn’t worth making all those underhand visits to my place and Réal’s to get this kind of pointless information.’

  But Mathilde’s anger had subsided.

  ‘Why didn’t you tell me all this in the first place?’ Adamsberg asked her.

  ‘I wasn’t sure about it, I had no evidence. And anyway, you must have noticed that I feel rather protective towards the circle man. Perhaps he has nobody but me on his side. That makes it a duty I can’t escape. And anyway, hell’s bells, I would hate to think that my personal notes could get into police files as reports on someone.’

  ‘Quite understandable,’ said Adamsberg. ‘Why did you use the word “greedy” about him? Funny thing, Louvenel used the same word. At any rate, when you were holding forth at the Dodin Bouffant you attracted a lot of attention. Anyone would only have had to come to you to find out more.’

  ‘But why?’

  ‘Like I said before. The manic ways of the circle man are an encouragement to murder.’

  As he spoke, using the term ‘manic’ for convenience, Adamsberg remembered that Vercors-Laury had explained to him that the man did not in fact present any of the characteristics of a compulsive mania. And that rather pleased him.

  ‘You didn’t get any unusual visits after the night at the Dodin Bouffant and the newspaper article?’ he went on.

  ‘No,’ said Mathilde. ‘Unless perhaps all the visits I get are unusual.’

  ‘After that night, did you follow the circle man any more?’

  ‘Yes, of course, several times.’

  ‘And nobody else was around?’

  ‘I didn’t notice anything. But I wasn’t particularly bothered anyway.’

  ‘What about you?’ said Adamsberg, turning towards Charles Reyer. ‘What have you come along for?’

  ‘I’m accompanying madame, monsieur le commissaire.’

  ‘Why?’

  ‘For something to do.’

  ‘Or to find out more. They tell me that when Mathilde Forestier goes diving, she goes alone, contrary to the rules of the profession. She’s not in the habit of taking someone along to accompany or protect her.’

  The blind man smiled.

  ‘Madame Forestier was furious. She asked me if I wanted to come and witness the meeting. I said yes. It gives me something to do at the end of the day. But I’m disappointed too. You managed to calm her down rather too quickly.’

  ‘Don’t you believe it,’ said Adamsberg, with a smile. ‘She’s got plenty more lies up her sleeve. But did you, for instance, know about the article in the 5th arrondissement magazine?’

  ‘It’s not published in Braille,’ said Charles crossly. ‘But yes, I heard about it. Happy now? And Mathilde, does that bother you? Does it scare you?’

  ‘Couldn’t give a damn either way,’ said Mathilde. Charles shrugged and ran his fingers under his dark glasses.

  ‘Someone mentioned it at the hotel,’ he w
ent on. ‘One of the guests standing in the lobby.’

  ‘See?’ said Adamsberg, turning to Mathilde. ‘News travels fast, it even reaches people who can’t read. And what did he say, this guest in the lobby?’

  ‘Something like “That deep-sea diving lady is at it again. Now she’s pally with the madman who does the circles.” That’s all I heard. Not very informative.’

  ‘Why did you tell me so willingly that you knew about it? It puts you in an awkward position. You know that you’re already regarded with some suspicion. You arrived at Mathilde’s by some sort of miracle, and you’ve got no alibi for the night of the murder.’

  ‘You know that, do you?’

  ‘Naturally – Danglard’s been doing his job.’

  ‘If I hadn’t told you myself, you would have tried to find out and you would have found out. Better to avoid being detected in a lie, isn’t it?’

  Reyer gave one of those wicked smiles with which he would have liked to carve up the universe.

  ‘But I didn’t know,’ he added, ‘that the person I spoke to in the café in the rue Saint-Jacques was Madame Forestier. I only made the connection later.’

  ‘Yes,’ said Adamsberg, ‘you already told me that.’

  ‘Well, you repeat yourself too.’

  ‘It’s always like that at certain moments in an investigation. People repeat themselves. Then the press reports that “the police are baffled”.’

  ‘Sections two and three,’ sighed Mathilde.

  ‘And then, suddenly, things move on,’ said Adamsberg, ‘and you don’t have time to say anything.’

  ‘Section one,’ added Mathilde.

  ‘You’re right, Mathilde,’ said Adamsberg, looking at her. ‘Same as in everything else. It all goes either too slowly or too fast.’

  ‘Not very original as an idea,’ muttered Charles.

  ‘I often say unoriginal things,’ said Adamsberg. ‘I repeat myself, I make obvious remarks – in short, I disappoint people. Does that never happen to you, Monsieur Reyer?’

  ‘I try not to let it happen,’ said the blind man. ‘I detest banal conversations.’

  ‘They don’t bother me at all,’ said Adamsberg.

  ‘That’ll do,’ said Mathilde. ‘I don’t like it when the commissaire starts talking like this. We’ll get nowhere. I prefer to wait for your investigation to make a leap forward, commissaire, and then your eyes will light up again.’

  ‘Not a very original idea, either,’ said Adamsberg with a smile.

  ‘It’s true that in her poetico-sentimental metaphors, Mathilde does not flinch from the grossest banalities,’ remarked Reyer. ‘Though they’re different from yours.’

  ‘Have you two quite finished? Can we just go now?’ said Mathilde. ‘You’re perfectly exasperating, the pair of you. In your different ways.’

  Adamsberg waved his hand and smiled, and found himself alone.

  Why had Charles Reyer found it necessary to say: ‘That’s all I heard’?

  Because he had heard more than that. Why, then, had he confessed to a fragment of the truth? To stop inquiries going any further.

  So Adamsberg called the Hôtel des Grands Hommes. The porter on duty remembered the article in the newsletter and what the guest had said. And yes, of course he remembered the blind man too. How could you forget a blind man like Reyer?

  ‘Did Reyer want to know any more about the article?’ asked Adamsberg.

  ‘Yes, indeed, monsieur le commissaire,’ said the porter. ‘He asked me to read the whole thing out to him. Otherwise I might not have remembered.’

  ‘And how did he react?’

  ‘Hard to say, monsieur le commissaire. He used to have an icy smile that made you feel like a moron. That day he was smiling like that, but I never knew what that meant.’

  Adamsberg thanked him and hung up. Charles Reyer had wanted to find out more. And he had accompanied Mathilde to the station. As for Mathilde, she certainly knew more about the chalk circle man than she was letting on. But of course none of that might be important. Thinking about this kind of information made Adamsberg feel tired. He got rid of it by passing it on to Danglard. If necessary, Danglard would do whatever had to be done better than he would. So now he could go on thinking about the chalk circle man without distraction. Mathilde was right, he was waiting for a sudden leap in the inquiry. And he also knew what she had meant about his eyes lighting up. Cliché though it might be, it means something when you say that a person’s eyes light up. It happens or it doesn’t. In his case, it depended on the moment. And just now he knew that his gaze was lost far out to sea.

  XI

  THAT NIGHT ADAMSBERG HAD A DISTURBING DREAM, A combination of pleasure and outlandishness. He saw Camille come into his room, wearing a bellhop’s uniform. Looking serious, she undressed and lay down alongside him. Although he realised he was dreaming, and that he was on a slippery slope, he had not resisted. Then the Cairo bellhop had appeared in person and burst out laughing, holding up ten fingers to indicate ‘I married her ten times.’ Next, Mathilde had arrived, saying, ‘He wants to arrest you’, and had dragged her daughter away from him. He had clung on to her. He would rather die than lose her to Mathilde. And he had realised that his dream was degenerating, and that the initial pleasure had vanished, so it would be best to put a stop to everything by waking up. It was four in the morning.

  Adamsberg got out of bed, cursing.

  He paced up and down in his flat. Yes, he was on a slippery slope. If only Mathilde had not told him that Camille was her daughter, she would not have come back into his life with a reality that he had kept at bay for years.

  No. That wasn’t right. It had started with that sudden feeling she was dead. That was when Camille had re-emerged from the far-off horizons where he had imagined her, fondly but distantly. But he had already made the acquaintance of Mathilde by then, and her Egyptian profile must have suggested Camille to him more strongly than before. That was how it had begun. Yes, that had been the start of the dangerous series of sensations resounding inside his head, as his memories were being prised up like slates in a high wind, opening gaps in a roof which had previously been carefully maintained. The slippery slope, dammit. Adamsberg had always placed little hope or expectation in love, not that he was opposed to feelings, which would have been pointless, but they weren’t the central thing in his life. That was just how it was, a deficiency on his part, he sometimes thought, or an advantage, as he thought at other times. And he never questioned this absence of belief in them. Nor was he about to do so tonight, more than any other night. But as he paced round the flat, he realised that he would have liked to hold Camille in his arms, if only for an hour. Being unable to do so frustrated him; he closed his eyes to imagine it, which didn’t help. Where was Camille? Why wasn’t she here, to lie in his arms until morning? Realising that he was a prisoner of a desire that could never be fulfilled, not now, not ever, exasperated him. It wasn’t so much the desire itself, since Adamsberg never allowed himself to be the prisoner of pride. It was the impression he had of wasting his time and his dreams in a futile and recurrent fantasy, knowing that life would have become much easier long ago if he had been able to forget it. And that was exactly what he had been unable to do. What wretched bad luck it had been to run into Mathilde.

  Unable to get back to sleep, he walked through the office door at five past six in the morning. So he was there to take the call ten minutes later from the police station in the 6th arrondissement. A circle had been spotted on the corner of the boulevard Saint-Michel and the long and deserted rue du Val-de-Grace. In its centre lay a pocket English-Spanish dictionary. Feeling out of sorts after his bad night, Adamsberg seized the opportunity to go back into the fresh air. A uniformed policeman was already there, guarding the blue chalk circle as if it were the holy shroud. The man was standing stiffly to attention beside the small dictionary. A ridiculous sight.

  ‘Am I going down some blind alley?’ Adamsberg wondered.

  Twenty
metres further down the boulevard, a café was already open. It was seven o’clock. He sat at an outside table and asked the waiter if the establishment stayed open late, and if so who was on duty between eleven-thirty and half past midnight. He thought that in order to get to the Luxembourg station the chalk circle man would have had to go past this café, that is if he was still using the metro. The proprietor came out to speak to him in person. His attitude was rather aggressive until Adamsberg showed him his card.

  ‘I recognise that name,’ the café owner said. ‘You’re a famous detective.’

  Adamsberg let this pass without comment. It made it easier to talk informally.

  ‘Yes,’ the café owner said after hearing him out. ‘Yes, I did see someone a bit suspicious who could be the one you’re after. It would have been just after midnight, he went past here, trotting along rather fast, when I was moving the tables on the terrace and shutting up shop. See these plastic chairs? They’re awkward, they fall over, they catch on things. One of them fell on its side, and he tripped up on it. I went over to help him up, but he pushed me away without a word, and off he went fast as he came, with a sort of satchel under his arm, that he kept tight hold of.’